Senior Living Operators in Rural Markets Lean on Reputation to Stand Out 

When it comes to growth and geography, some senior living operators are thinking small.

One such operator is Berrien Springs, Michigan-based Dockerty Health Care Services, a senior living provider with 12 communities around Michigan. The operator, which recently expanded into Wisconsin, sticks to rural markets with the philosophy that reputation and experience can stand out, according to CEO Tim Dockerty.

“You have a good opportunity to build reputation in those communities, and you really get integrated into them,” Dockerty told Senior Housing News.

Braintree, Massachusetts-based Senior Living Residences got its start in a rural setting before expanding into primary markets. Today, CEO Tadd Clelland sees those rural communities as part of the operator’s roots, and believe they have an important place in the company’s future. In those markets, SLR can differentiate itself and strive to be the premier operator in the surrounding area, he said.

Doing business in rural markets is not for the faint of heart. Once an operator gains a community’s trust, they can stand out from their competitors. But as it is said, reputations can fall apart quickly, and that damage is significantly harder to recover from.

Dallas-based Frontier Senior Living has four communities in rural markets in Washington and Arizona, and the company’s leaders are looking to take on more through management or acquisition. According to CEO Greg Roderick, a well-located operator can act as a community hub even in smaller markets.  

“If people are talking positively about you, you are really involved and where your executive director is nearly the mayor of that town, you will be rewarded fantastically,” Roderick said.

The double-edged sword of rural markets

Rural markets carry challenges and opportunities that many operators see as two sides of the same coin.

Rural markets often lack the deeper labor pools of larger ones, making hiring difficult and leaving some operators to subsist on agency staffing to make ends meet.

The flip side to that challenge is that, if operators treat their workers well, they can gain loyal and passionate employees, according to Dockerty. Operators must sometimes cast a wider net for rural workers, totaling 10 and 15 miles or more away from the community.

To help with retention, Dockerty makes himself available to staff to address concerns or issues they run into during the job.

“Being involved in those communities as owners is very valuable. It prevents a lot of problems that would otherwise happen,” he said.

Senior Living Residences’ recruitment and retention efforts across the company include regular wage and benefit analysis, important tools to hire new workers. Senior Living Residences offers standard benefits such as a matching 401k account in addition to things likepet insurance and discounts at surrounding stores that staff frequent.

Clelland sees opportunities for recruiting immigrant workers to staff communities in rural markets. Other recruitment ideas include covering the cost of leasing vehicles for staff who have to drive significant distances for work and continuing education offerings, which would lead to “stickiness” within the organization as staff seek internal promotions.

Frontier’s rural markets present an opportunity to act as a trusted source in the area. The operator’s leaders introduce themselves and host events for prospective residents and their families before opening up in a rural market. Operating in rural markets comes at the cost and pressure of “being great every single day,” Roderick said.

“You cannot have bad meals without someone going out and around that town to tell the whole world how bad that meal was,” Roderick said.

The importance of reputation

A senior living community’s reputation is substantially more important in smaller markets than in larger ones. Building and maintaining that reputation starts from the moment operators move in.

Frontier leaders builds relationships with the company’s residents and members of the surrounding community through offering the community as event space first before moving on to connecting with the local referral partners such as regional hospital dispatch planners and elder law attorneys. Because there are overall less referral sources in these markets, building and maintaining these relationships is paramount, Roderick said.

“If you don’t make a great relationship with that person, you’ve just lost that referral source, maybe for a long time,” he said.

Community and operator reputation extends to more than just occupancy and staff. Overcoming IT issues and handling connectivity before it becomes a problem are ways to gain trust and respect from families, Dockerty said.

“In a small community, if you have those relationships, they’re pretty loyal,” Dockerty said.

Like Roderick, Senior Living Residences’ Clelland believes that operators must strive for excellence in tours and other public-facing avenues in order to build a reputation. Rural markets are smaller, and prospects or potentially employees sometimes are choosing between just two communities at a time. If one looks worse or less capable in comparison to the other, it may suffer.

However, despite the challenges, Clelland sees some of its rural communities as its strongest performances when it comes to benchmarks such as turnover and occupancy. Nashoba Park in Ayer, Massachusetts, for example, ran into challenges from the COVID pandemic. The executive director at the community built a sales team from the ground up and drastically lowered employee turnover, Clelland said, and now the community is enjoying around 98% occupancy.

“Nearly every department head that she’s hired is still there,” Clelland said. “She’s been highlighted at our executive directors’ meetings as an incredible turnaround story. She’s no longer on our focus community calls and hasn’t been for some time.”